Microsoft/Samsung Ink Patent Deal

An anonymous reader wrote with an article at ZDNet, discussing further implications of their patent cross-licensing initiative. With options already in place with Fuji Xerox, the company is now signed up with Samsung as well. From Samsung's perspective, it is simple: these deals ensure it can sell products using Linux without facing a suit from the Redmond-based corporation. "The notion that customers and businesses need Microsoft's legal go-ahead to run Linux has been controversial for some time, with the issue rising to the surface last November after Microsoft reached an accord with Linux vendor Novell. Novell has since taken issue with Microsoft's assertion that the deal represents an acknowledgment that Linux infringes on Microsoft patents."

Comments

Ridiculous

[ihavnoid]

How in world did Zonk 'imagine' that Samsung signed patent cross-licensing because of Linux? Remember that Samsung is a fairly large company, and I remember that most of the software code Samsung uses isn't based on open-source anyway.

Come on. They are simiply trying to minimize business risk, not trying to bash/crush/destroy Linux. Nothing else.

Yes, this is Slashdot, so anybody who does anything with Microsoft will be evil. Oh. I see. Never mind.

(btw, I believe that both parties would be interested in patents related to video/audio stuff, not something like operating systems.)